Latest / The David Rubenstein Show / Ana Botin

Transcript

Ana Botin · The David Rubenstein Show

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: One of the most successful banks in the world is
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: actually based in Spain, but operates all over the world.
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: It's Banco Santander. For four generations, the Botin family has
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: controlled and led Banco Santander and helped build it into
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: a global behemoth in the banking world. I had a
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: chance to sit down with the executive chairman, Ana Botin,
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: to talk about how she's operating in the new world
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: of banking, particularly as artificial intelligence comes into this world.
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: What is it about Banco Santander that enabled it to
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: grow from a city in Spain to a global bank,
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: what would you say is the single or the two
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: most important things that enable you to be this successful?
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: We have a culture of constantly reinventing ourselves, of disrupting ourselves.
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: We have always been brave on that side. We were
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: the first to have the automated tellers, the first to
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: build our own core technology back in the 90s. which
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: we then actually, we got behind. So we're trying to
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: do that in a better way. So reinventing yourself, be
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: willing to disrupt yourself with three things in mind. First
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: is remaining relevant to your customers. So it's not how
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: I see the product, it's how you as a customer
• 1:13
  Speaker 2: see the product. You know, an example is unsecured lending.
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: It's the same thing as buy now, pay later, but
• 1:20
  Speaker 2: from the customer point of view, it's not the same.
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: So customer point of view, trust, super important. and really
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: staying true to your values. You know, think what comes next.
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: Now, you must have observed there are very few women
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: at the top of major commercial banks. Why do you
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: think that is? And do you think it's changing?
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: It takes time because, you know, I think women have
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: a bigger issue with speaking up and raising their hand
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: and saying, I can do that job and I can
• 1:50
  Speaker 2: do more. It's something I've seen for years. Hasn't changed.
• 1:55
  Speaker 2: A lot of the ways that people get promoted is
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: because they have strong relationships. They go and play golf.
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: They go and do things that are usually men. And
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: so that also doesn't help at all. So we need
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: to be actively helping women because otherwise they don't get
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: the same chance. I think everybody should get the same chance.
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: Your last quarter was very strong. You had strong earnings growth.
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: What areas did the growth come from? And what makes
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: you optimistic about the future based on the last quarter?
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: So our first quarter results were very much on track
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: towards our three-year targets. We did especially well on our
• 2:37
  Speaker 2: retail bank and especially well in Europe retail. So Spain
• 2:41
  Speaker 2: is growing four times as fast as the rest of Europe.
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: And that has been a key growth market this year.
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: Mexico is doing really well. Again, a country that's growing
• 2:50
  Speaker 2: more this year than last year. But importantly, we did
• 2:54
  Speaker 2: three M & A transactions last year. We sold Poland
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: and we bought into the UK and US. So one
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: of the things that will give Santander, as we've said
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: in the first quarter, a differential increase in return on
• 3:07
  Speaker 2: tangible equity and earnings per share will be the integration
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: of the M & A.
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: After the Great Recession, many European banks suffered a bit.
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: American banks suffered, but they came back. And now... the
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: American banks tend to be more dominant than the European
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: banks were. Banco Santander is an exception. But why do
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: you think the European banks haven't played as big a
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: role on the global scene as the American banks have lately?
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: So that's a great question. And there's no easy answer.
• 3:38
  Speaker 2: It's a number of factors. One is the size of
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: the market. So Europe is not really a single market
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: in services or banking. The U.S.
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: Is.
• 3:46
  Speaker 2: It took us six years to launch our digital bank
• 3:49
  Speaker 2: in Germany. It took us two years to launch Open
• 3:51
  Speaker 2: Bank across the United States. So size of the market, growth,
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: Europe has grown slower than the United States has over
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: the last decade, much slower. And the third factor is
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: regulation and supervision. That's a huge tax on businesses and
• 4:08
  Speaker 2: people and economies. And it has been tougher in Europe
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: than it has in the US. A combination of all
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: those things, I think, is what's behind it. I do
• 4:18
  Speaker 2: not think we run banks worse in Europe than the country.
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: I think we run banks in general pretty well.
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: Now, you also have a very big presence in Latin America,
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: particularly in Brazil. How did you get to be so
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: big in Brazil? That's not a Spanish-speaking country.
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: Things happen sequentially. So we started in the Spanish-speaking markets
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: like Mexico, Chile. Brazil was in the 90s. Actually, I
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: was the one in charge of Latin America at the time.
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: We started with a small bank, but very importantly, with
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: a local team. So we started actually with a corporate
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: bank and knowledge of the market. And then from there,
• 4:53
  Speaker 2: when there were opportunities to acquire banks, we started with
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: a small one and then a bigger one. We became
• 4:58
  Speaker 2: very good at integrating banks and we became very good
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: in technology. And that is what allowed us to grow
• 5:05
  Speaker 2: in Brazil into the second largest private bank.
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: Now, you've made an acquisition in the United States, Webster Financial,
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: for which I think you paid about $ 12 billion. What
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: is Webster Financial, and is that making you a bigger
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: presence in the United States now?
• 5:19
  Speaker 2: You should think of us as a global bank with
• 5:21
  Speaker 2: a very strong presence in Europe and the Americas. And
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: so that is the essential core of Santander. What Webster
• 5:28
  Speaker 2: brings is precisely the commercial bank business that we didn't
• 5:33
  Speaker 2: have in the United States. You think of Webster as...
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: integrating with Santander Bank, which was a consumer bank. So
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: it's a very complementary business. It's a very cheap funding,
• 5:44
  Speaker 2: so they have a lot of retail deposits. And so
• 5:47
  Speaker 2: the combination of very attractive funding with the commercial bank side,
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: which is essentially what Santander is in other countries, make
• 5:55
  Speaker 2: it the perfect match.
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: You expect to make other acquisitions in the United States,
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: or this will be the core acquisition around which you'll
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: build your business in the United States?
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: We have always said, and I continue to say, that
• 6:06
  Speaker 2: we have a lot of organic profitable growth. This is
• 6:09
  Speaker 2: unique compared to other banks. When we see very strong
• 6:12
  Speaker 2: strategic fit that makes financial sense, i.e. it's above a
• 6:16
  Speaker 2: cost of equity, buybacks, and it competes well with organic
• 6:20
  Speaker 2: profitable growth, then we consider acquisitions. But we are very
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: focused on integration right now.
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: Is the biggest source of your profitability consumer banking or
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: is it commercial banking?
• 6:32
  Speaker 2: Consumer and commercial together is 70%, probably 80%. The rest
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: is the corporate investment bank and wealth management. So around 80%
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: of our business is retail and commercial. And that is
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: about half and half. Half is consumer and individuals. The
• 6:49
  Speaker 2: other half is the 4 million SMEs and commercial customers.
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: Now, many European banks say that the regulations in Europe
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: are tougher than they are in the United States. And
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: and more difficult. Have you found that to be the case?
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: Is the American regulatory scheme more likable to your top
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: people than what you have in Europe?
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: So my view on regulation is we should turn it
• 7:12
  Speaker 2: into a competitive advantage. Banking is all about trust. Highly
• 7:16
  Speaker 2: regulated entities at the end do have a lot of safeguards.
• 7:20
  Speaker 2: And so At the end, Europe has a lot to
• 7:24
  Speaker 2: do in terms of being more competitive. Smarter regulation is
• 7:28
  Speaker 2: a key goal for us in Europe. The US is ahead.
• 7:32
  Speaker 2: The UK is ahead. But I believe Europe is catching up.
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: Now, when interest rates go up, is it better for
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: banks because they can charge more, but they have to
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: give more from deposits? So the ECB not long ago
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: increased interest rates. Is that a good thing for European
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: banks or banks like yours?
• 7:50
  Speaker 2: So the answer is it depends on the type of business.
• 7:54
  Speaker 2: This is one of Santander's great strengths that people overlook.
• 7:57
  Speaker 2: It's not that the geographic diversification, it's the business diversification.
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: So on the retail and commercial side, it's an advantage,
• 8:04
  Speaker 2: slightly higher rates, as long as they don't go too high,
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: so then bad loans increase. So we're at the sweet spot.
• 8:10
  Speaker 2: It's like loan loss is very low, employment is high,
• 8:15
  Speaker 2: so slightly higher rates is good for our retail commercial.
• 8:18
  Speaker 2: It's not as good for our consumer lender, which is
• 8:20
  Speaker 2: open bank. Net-net, it's a positive. Why? Because retail commercial
• 8:25
  Speaker 2: within retail, that's bigger than the pure consumer lender.
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: The biggest challenge for the banking community in Europe and
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: the United States now, is it inflation or is it
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: the uncertainty of artificial intelligence?
• 8:39
  Speaker 2: The biggest uncertainty right now is the lack of growth
• 8:43
  Speaker 2: or lack of enough growth. We need to accelerate growth
• 8:46
  Speaker 2: because of all the challenges we have to finance pensions,
• 8:49
  Speaker 2: to finance the energy transition, to finance the fence. So
• 8:53
  Speaker 2: we need faster growth, not least because of the high
• 8:57
  Speaker 2: level of government debt. So I think that's the biggest
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: challenge the world faces.
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: Speaking of government debt, in the United States, we've got $ 34,
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: $ 35 trillion of debt not counting the unfunded Social Security,
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: Medicare obligations. Europe has a fair amount of debt as well.
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: Do you worry that the debt burden in the United
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: States may really hurt the U.S. economy in the foreseeable future?
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: Or do you think it can be managed?
• 9:20
  Speaker 2: That is only a problem if you don't grow enough.
• 9:23
  Speaker 2: And so the U.S. traditionally has been able to go
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: from having a lot of debt to much less because
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: it can grow fast enough to actually pay for that debt.
• 9:32
  Speaker 2: So by the way, the level of taxes overall in
• 9:35
  Speaker 2: the US is very much lower than in Europe. So
• 9:37
  Speaker 2: I think there's a lot of levers the US has
• 9:40
  Speaker 2: to tackle the debt, which is higher than in Europe,
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: by the way. Europe, if you take Germany, which is
• 9:47
  Speaker 2: obviously part of Europe, has a much lower debt, but
• 9:49
  Speaker 2: much lower growth.
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: Now, the United States has gotten itself in the middle
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: of a war in Iran. And it seems to be,
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: as we talked today, still going on. Has that had
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: any impact on your bank yet, or on the economy
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: in Europe, or in your view on the economy in
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: the United States? Has it fueled inflation, or has it
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: not yet been seen?
• 10:08
  Speaker 2: So, as far as our bank is concerned, we reiterated
• 10:12
  Speaker 2: all our targets after Q1, so we will deliver the
• 10:15
  Speaker 2: numbers that we predicted for the year. So, Energy, inflation
• 10:20
  Speaker 2: obviously impact our business, but because of the diversification on
• 10:24
  Speaker 2: a net basis, it will be the same. This is
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: one of the great strengths of Santander. Again, business and
• 10:31
  Speaker 2: geographic diversification. We do believe that inflation will tend to
• 10:37
  Speaker 2: come down if the conflict ends soon. So that is
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: the tendency we're seeing for next year.
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: Now, based on your knowledge of what's likely to happen
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: in the U.S. economy or what you've seen so far,
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: what do you think the U.S. economy will be doing
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: in the next quarter or two quarters or three quarters?
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: And what do you think about Europe? Are you optimistic
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: or are you nervous about the economic growth in these areas?
• 11:01
  Speaker 2: If I had to summarize in one sentence what's going
• 11:03
  Speaker 2: on on both sides of the Atlantic, I would say
• 11:05
  Speaker 2: it's remarkable resilience. So both the U.S. and Europe are
• 11:09
  Speaker 2: growing very with relatively low inflation, very low unemployment, in
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: a context of very high geopolitical uncertainty. So I do
• 11:20
  Speaker 2: think remarkable resilience, the consumer is suffering at the bottom end,
• 11:24
  Speaker 2: but actually overall doing pretty good, and investment is picking up.
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: So as long as the geopolitical situation comes down a bit,
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: I think next year will be better than this year.
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: So if you're the executive chair of a bank that's
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: based in Spain, but it's all over Europe, and it's
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: the United States and Latin America. How much of your
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: time is on an airplane?
• 11:46
  Speaker 2: A lot.
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: And how do you avoid jet lag?
• 11:50
  Speaker 2: Oh, my God. I measure everything in life. So, you know,
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: I measure, and like a good banker, I measure it twice.
• 11:56
  Speaker 2: So I have URA and I have Fitbit. For the five,
• 12:00
  Speaker 2: six years, I've measured what makes me sleep better, what
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: happens when I have jet lag, how sports affects me.
• 12:06
  Speaker 2: And so I try to improve by measuring and getting
• 12:11
  Speaker 2: better at what helps me have more energy. It's essential,
• 12:16
  Speaker 2: taking care of yourself.
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: Now, where were you born?
• 12:19
  Speaker 2: I was born in Santander. I lived in Santander until
• 12:22
  Speaker 2: I was 13 years old. And then for the next
• 12:24
  Speaker 2: 20 years, I lived in six or seven different countries.
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: I went to university in the United States, but I
• 12:30
  Speaker 2: lived in the UK. I went to school. I went
• 12:33
  Speaker 2: to Austria. I went to France. So I lived in
• 12:35
  Speaker 2: many different places.
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: And your undergraduate degree is from Bryn Mawr?
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: It's from Bryn Mawr.
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: And did you think when you were at Bryn Mawr
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: that you would ever be running a major bank?
• 12:44
  Speaker 2: Never.
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: But did you have interest in finance then, or did
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: your father say you will like it eventually?
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: My father never said anything to me. I joined J.P. Morgan.
• 12:53
  Speaker 2: I was in J.P. Morgan for eight years just because
• 12:55
  Speaker 2: they came to recruit. Even though my degree is from
• 12:58
  Speaker 2: Bryn Mawr, actually my last year was at Harvard. So
• 13:01
  Speaker 2: I was recruited into JP Morgan, and I was there
• 13:04
  Speaker 2: for eight years. Then I came back to Spain and
• 13:07
  Speaker 2: started working for Santander.
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: And it wasn't preordained that you would become the executive chair,
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: I guess, right?
• 13:14
  Speaker 2: No, it was not.
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: Now, there is a woman who's the head of the ECB,
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: Christine Lagarde, in Europe. And was that a job you
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: would ever aspire to have? No. Not interested in public
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: service in that way, or just you like being executive
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: chairman of the Banco Santander?
• 13:28
  Speaker 2: Well, first, I love my job. At the end, if
• 13:31
  Speaker 2: you go into public service, at least if I were
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: to consider doing that, it would be because I can
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: have an impact. That's really what motivates me, having a
• 13:39
  Speaker 2: big impact. And with 180 million customers across Europe and
• 13:45
  Speaker 2: the Americas, and indirectly impacting over 500 million people, that's
• 13:50
  Speaker 2: a population of the United States. If you take companies
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: and people that work for those companies, I can have
• 13:55
  Speaker 2: a much bigger impact where I am.
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: What do you do when you're not banking. You are
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: running this large bank. You're the executive chairman of it,
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: but do you have any outside interest?
• 14:05
  Speaker 2: My biggest interest is my family. I spend a lot
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: of time with my family. I think that is what
• 14:10
  Speaker 2: gives me balance. I have a great partner in my husband.
• 14:12
  Speaker 2: He's helped me 50-50 with raising our sons. I love
• 14:18
  Speaker 2: playing golf. I love hiking. I love nature. I like music.
• 14:22
  Speaker 2: I still play the piano. My mother founded a very
• 14:25
  Speaker 2: prestigious globally recognized music school.
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: What's the great pleasure of the job you have now?
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: What's fun about being the executive chairman of Banco Santander?
• 14:35
  Speaker 2: So I was lucky to be outside banking for three years.
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: I started a private equity fund. I was literally, in
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: a nice way, asked to leave by my father after
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: it was this big merger in Spain because I was
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: apparently a threat to the new CEO. It's a long story.
• 14:50
  Speaker 2: So I set up a tech company. I set up
• 14:54
  Speaker 2: a private equity fund and two foundations. And I found
• 14:59
  Speaker 2: that being on the other side of the table from
• 15:01
  Speaker 2: a bank was actually pretty hard if you were a
• 15:03
  Speaker 2: small business. So my passion is visiting small customers and
• 15:07
  Speaker 2: helping them. It's amazing, like just a few days ago,
• 15:12
  Speaker 2: my makeup artist tells me, I've been trying to buy
• 15:15
  Speaker 2: a home. Every single bank in Spain has said they
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: cannot give me a mortgage. And being able to understand
• 15:21
  Speaker 2: what that person needs and you know, getting your company
• 15:25
  Speaker 2: to not just fix it for him, but potentially for
• 15:28
  Speaker 2: thousands of others, that is the best thing in the world.
• 15:32
  Speaker 2: And so, you know, I love seeing big customers, but
• 15:35
  Speaker 2: I love helping, you know, entrepreneurs, the self-employed or small
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: companies get financing and be able to do what they
• 15:45
  Speaker 2: need to do in life.
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: Not long ago, I interviewed somebody who started a fintech
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: company in Europe called Revolut. And it seems to be
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: doing quite well. Do you worry about companies like Revolut
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: as kind of taking away some of your core business,
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: or do you think you can do the same thing
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: they're doing?
• 16:01
  Speaker 2: They're definitely one of the better, if not the best,
• 16:05
  Speaker 2: fintech company in the world. My job is to, and
• 16:09
  Speaker 2: I will, and we will as a team, build a
• 16:12
  Speaker 2: better product pretty soon so that you can instantly pay
• 16:16
  Speaker 2: across all our footprint and beyond in three seconds, make
• 16:20
  Speaker 2: payments cross-border.
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: As you look at what you're doing, what are you
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: most proud of what you've achieved so far?
• 16:26
  Speaker 2: So I'm most proud of having been able to deliver
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: the numbers the right way, which I describe as not
• 16:34
  Speaker 2: just delivering this quarter, but investing for the future. A
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: big thing right now is one transformation. It's how do
• 16:40
  Speaker 2: you take a group of banks and convert them into
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: a truly global institution. So one transformation is all about
• 16:48
  Speaker 2: changing the business model and global platforms. So open bank,
• 16:51
  Speaker 2: it's our front end. It's our revolute. Gravity is our
• 16:55
  Speaker 2: core system. So really building platforms that are going to
• 16:58
  Speaker 2: be able to deliver in a much better way.
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: So in the future, do you think that there will
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: be physical banks where people go and put their money
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: in and borrow money and actually talk to tellers? Or
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: is that going to be a thing of the past
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: in five or 10 years?
• 17:13
  Speaker 2: I believe in the personal relationship. I believe in the experience,
• 17:16
  Speaker 2: and that's what we're building. So I truly believe it's
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: people talking to people, but leveraging a very strong digital offering.
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: So we're only as good as we are on our iPhones,
• 17:26
  Speaker 2: but we also need people in branches with an experience.
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: Being the bridge between Europe and the Americas is huge.
• 17:33
  Speaker 2: There's nobody else like Santander that can do that. You
• 17:36
  Speaker 2: know who's the biggest trading partner for the United States?
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: European Union. Do you know that Mexico is the third
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: largest trading partner, the UK the sixth largest? So we're
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: unique to connect all these companies. And what's really important,
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: in today's economy, there's a huge number of self-employed, and
• 17:56
  Speaker 2: they want to go global. Even one single person with
• 18:00
  Speaker 2: AI can do amazing things. Sometimes that is the best
• 18:03
  Speaker 2: way to connect with many countries. Again, Europe and America
• 18:07
  Speaker 2: is instantly.
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: Now, there's a concern in the AI world that AI
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: will produce a lot of job losses for people. In
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: Banco Santander, are you worried that job losses will occur,
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: or do you think it will actually produce more jobs
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: for the bank?
• 18:24
  Speaker 2: Well, if you look at the numbers across all our co-markets,
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: we're at historically high employment levels. There's definitely a change,
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: so the jobs will be different. There could be some
• 18:34
  Speaker 2: adjustment as we go through this, but we're not seeing
• 18:37
  Speaker 2: right now any big impact in terms of employment. Now,
• 18:41
  Speaker 2: it might happen, for sure will happen at some point.
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: AI seems to be dominated now by American technology companies.
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: Do you think Europe is falling behind in the AI race?
• 18:51
  Speaker 2: We're working with all the LLMs. We're working on what
• 18:54
  Speaker 2: we call an orchestration layer, and there's many things that
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: we can build. you can build very efficient vertical models.
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: You don't need the most advanced models for some task.
• 19:04
  Speaker 2: And so what we do is we have our own
• 19:06
  Speaker 2: teams and all of that is embedded in the businesses
• 19:09
  Speaker 2: where we work with the large companies and then we
• 19:11
  Speaker 2: decide which one we use. But very importantly, we're building
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: our own agents. We have 280 AI agents up and
• 19:18
  Speaker 2: running inside Santander. And we do that within a very
• 19:22
  Speaker 2: secure perimeter to make sure that we do that safely.
• 19:25
  Speaker 2: That is what you get with a highly regulated bank. So-
• 19:28
  Speaker 2: We think there's a huge opportunity for a bank like ours.
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: So you're a role model for executives in the banking
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: world because you are heading up a major bank. So
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: what does it take to be a global banker?
• 19:40
  Speaker 2: It's all about the team. So having the team that
• 19:43
  Speaker 2: is going to get you where you want and be
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: great at their jobs and work well together is the key.
• 19:49
  Speaker 2: And for that, you need to have a vision. You
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: need to tell them where it is you're going. You
• 19:53
  Speaker 2: also have to be good at attracting. I've always said
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: people that at what they do are better than you,
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: better than I am. And that is absolutely essential.
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: So if you were a young person coming out of
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: college or graduate school today, why should you want to
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: work in a large commercial bank? Why not go work
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: in private equity or hedge funds. Isn't it more lucrative
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: to do that? And why should somebody want to come
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: work at a bank like yours?
• 20:17
  Speaker 2: Because what we do matters, because we have a purpose,
• 20:20
  Speaker 2: which is to help people, businesses prosper. We've done that
• 20:23
  Speaker 2: for 170 years. And in the AI age, we have
• 20:27
  Speaker 2: a huge advantage. For the first time in years, because
• 20:31
  Speaker 2: of the amount of data we have, because of the
• 20:33
  Speaker 2: AI tools that we are putting in place, we can
• 20:37
  Speaker 2: actually use that data in a much better way. And
• 20:40
  Speaker 2: this is what I call squaring the circle. We can
• 20:42
  Speaker 2: personalize every single one of our products for 180 million
• 20:47
  Speaker 2: customers and do that profitably. The possibilities of AI mean
• 20:51
  Speaker 2: that we are attracting top talent, not just from Europe,
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: from the United States, coming to work for us at Santander.
• 20:57
  Speaker 2: So I'm very excited about what this means for us
• 21:01
  Speaker 2: and for the potential of the bank.
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: Thanks for listening. To hear more of my interviews, you
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: can subscribe and download my podcast on Spotify, Apple, or
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: wherever you listen.